on reading - anne lamott

Writing and reading decrease our sense of isolation. They deepen and
widen and expand our sense of life: they feed the soul. When writers
make us shake our heads with the exactness of their prose and their
truths, and even make us laugh about ourselves or life, our buoyancy
is restored. We are given a shot at dancing with, or at least clapping
along with, the absurdity of life, instead of being squashed by it over
and over again.

It's like singing on a boat during a terrible storm at sea. You can't stop
the raging storm, but singing can change the hearts and spirits of the
people who are together on that ship.

- Anne Lamott, Bird by Bird: Some Instructions on Writing and Life

on writing - anne lamott

The realities of writing via Anne Lamott's Bird by Bird:

"But how?" my students ask.  "How do you actually do it?"
You sit down, I say.  You try to sit down at approximately the
same time every day.  This is how you train your unconscious
to kick in for you creatively.

The first draft is the child's draft, where you let it all pour out
and then let it romp all over the place, knowing that no one is
going to see it and that you can shape it later...  The second draft
is the up draft - you fix it up.  And the third draft is the dental
draft, where you check every tooth, to see if it's loose or
cramped or decayed, or even, God help us, healthy.